Tag: diseases

Sugar is the generalised name for sweet, short-chain and soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. There are various kinds of such carbohydrates, which are derived from different sources, mainly plants, and extracted in sufficient concentrations from sugar-cane and sugar beet.

Simple sugars are called monosaccharides and include glucose (also known as dextrose), fructose and galactose. The table or granulated sugar that is often used as food is sucrose. This is a disaccharide that hydrolyses in the body into fructose and glucose.

In recent times, the awareness of the relationship between sugar and chronic diseases is ever-growing and cannot be over-emphasised. According to a study published in 2013, nearly one in five deaths in the United States is now associated with obesity.

Obesity is, indeed, a marker for chronic and potentially deadly disease, but the underlying problem that links obesity to so many other serious health issues — including heart disease, arthritis, cancer, infertility and diabetes — is metabolic dysfunction. Now, mounting evidence clearly shows that added sugars and processed fructose are a primary driver of metabolic dysfunction.

One of the primary sources of calories for many of us is sugar — specifically high fructose corn syrup in soda, fruit juice and processed foods. Because of advances in food processing technology in the 1970s, fructose derived from corn has become very cheap and it is widely used in the majority of processed foods for increased sales.

The body metabolises fructose much differently from glucose, which is the energy that most body cells and, indeed, all living cells utilize; so that only about 20 per cent of glucose in the body is metabolised by the liver as most cells utilise it for energy.

On the contrary, the entire burden of metabolising fructose falls on the liver, where excess fructose is quickly converted into fat – very low density lipoproteins and triglycerides. This explains why many people experience weight gain and abdominal obesity.

Refined fructose is actually broken down very much like alcohol, thus damaging the liver and causing mitochondrial and metabolic dysfunction in the same way as ethanol and other toxins. It also causes more severe metabolic dysfunction because it is readily metabolised into fat than any other sugar.

The fact that refined fructose is far more harmful to health than other sugars was recently highlighted in a meta-review published in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings — the premier high quality peer-reviewed clinical journal in general and internal medicine. According to modern Mayr medicine, many of the harmful bacteria in the intestinal tract, such as candida and other fungi, multiply rapidly when sugar is present in the tract, since they are able to digest sugar.

A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association concluded that there’s “a significant relationship between added sugar consumption and increased risk for cardiovascular disease mortality.”

The 15-year-long study, which included data for 31,000 Americans, found that those who consumed 25 per cent or more of their daily calories as sugar were more than two times as likely to die from heart disease as those who got less than 10 per cent of their calories from sugar.

On the whole, the odds of dying from heart disease rose in proportion with the percentage of added sugar in the diet, regardless of the age, sex, physical activity level and body-mass index.

Fructose is the primary cause of non-alcoholic fatty liver and elevates uric acid, which raises blood pressure, stresses the kidneys and leads to the chronic, low-level inflammation that is at the core of most chronic diseases, like arthritis, that cause heart attack and stroke.

Metabolically speaking, fructose is alcohol “without the buzz”. Elevated uric acid levels has been implicated by many studies in diseases like arthritis, hypertension, heart disease, obesity, stoke, kidney disease and preeclampsia in pregnancy — where uric acid’s ability to promote inflammation, oxidative stress and endothelial dysfunction have a debilitating impact on placental development and function, as well as maternal vascular health.

Fructose tricks our body into gaining weight by giving false signals to our metabolism. It turns off the body’s appetite-control system. It does not appropriately stimulate insulin, which in turn does not suppress ghrelin (the “hunger hormone”) and doesn’t stimulate leptin (the “satiety hormone”), which together result in you eating more and developing insulin resistance and eventually, diabetes.

Most of these changes are not seen when humans consume starch (glucose), showing that fructose is just outright a bad carbohydrate, especially when consumed at more than 25grams daily.

The majority of all this sugar is hidden in processed foods and beverages, so to address obesity and related health issues like diabetes, arthritis and heart disease, ridding our diet of processed foods, especially sugar, is key for success.

To prevent chronic diseases, such as diabetes, heart disease and cancer, the World Health Organisation suggests limiting sugar consumption to a maximum of five per cent of our daily calories, especially if one shows signs of insulin resistance such as being overweight, has high blood pressure, high cholesterol or diabetes.

At Mart-Life Detox Clinic, we help to relieve the liver of its daily burden of refining the crude materials we put into our body and, hence, rescue it from the harmful by-products of these substances, fructose being one of them.

The liver is rested, supported and rejuvenated by our various treatments and techniques specialised for this overworked organ of the body. Using our various therapies and procedures, we remove toxins from the body, reducing the stress on the liver.

Copyright PUNCH.All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from PUNCH.

Punch Games

A non-profit organisation, EpidAlert, says it has partnered the Lagos State Government to prevent, detect and respond to disease threats through communications and technology.

The Chief Executive Officer of EpidAlert, Dr Lawal Bakare, said the collaboration would help to curb increasing death rate from epidemic outbreaks in the country.

Bakare, who spoke at the inauguration of AlertClinic in Lagos, said there was urgent need to stop avoidable deaths resulting from epidemic outbreaks.

He said AlertClinic would aid health-risk detection and provide early support to communities whenever they were exposed to health risks.

Barake said, “The patterns of disease risks vary from time to time and place to place; as we speak, we are recording pockets of cholera outbreaks across Nigeria. Some months ago, we battled meningitis. Who knows what is looming right now; what should we expect and how should we prepare ourselves?

“AlertClinic is a means of supplying communities with this risk information so they can be reminded of simple practices required to mitigate the threats. People do not need to fear diseases; they just need to learn how to protect themselves against them. There are billions of organisms sharing this world with us, so we need to ensure that we are conscious of them and protect ourselves from getting harmed.”

Bakare explained that understanding the risks depended on data got through public health formations.

“For every risk that goes unidentified, we short-change our capacity to protect ourselves against it now and in the future. After learning to protect ourselves against malaria, diarrhoea, lassa fever and polio, communities need to be very vigilant,” he added.

Copyright PUNCH. All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from PUNCH.

Punch Games

Diseases are unsparing in the ways they ravage the human body. The bad thing about diseases is that they don’t just affect one organ of the body! Rather, the majority of debilitating diseases that afflict human also affect the sex life!

What are these diseases that mess up your sex life, in addition to making you miserable? These ones…

Cardiovascular diseases

These include heart failure, build-up of plaque in the arteries (atherosclerosis), cardiac arrest, etc. Urology Specialist, Dr. Enis Rauf, explains that for the male and female sex organs to function optimally, blood must reach them unhindered.

“The blood that comes and goes to the penis, and then trapped in there to achieve an erection, only works properly in men with a normally functioning cardiovascular system. When this system does not work properly, problems also occur in erections,” Rauf warns.

He adds that when people in a certain group complain of erection problems, if doctors can handle the problem sensibly, they can catch a cardiovascular disease in its early stage.

“Since the diameter of the main artery going to the penis is smaller than the heart arteries, any obstructions in these areas become evident very early on,” Rauf warns.

Diabetes

Diabetes happens to be one of the most devastating diseases that anyone can have.

According to diabetologist/Medical Director of Rainbow Specialist Hospital, Isiavwe Afokoghene, if not put under control through appropriate medications and sound lifestyle habit, diabetes complications can wreak untold havoc on all organs of the body such as the eyes, nerves, kidneys, and the heart; and it may eventually kill.

For men living with diabetes, low libido or low sex desire is a constant companion. This is mainly because of their high blood glucose levels.

Worse still, scientists warn, even when a diabetic man is able to have sex, he may be unable to reach orgasm!

“High sugar levels in men with diabetes can affect the function of the nerves in the penis, leading to erectile function,” physicians warn.

Indeed, a study published in the peer-reviewed journal, Diabetes Care, reveals that, for people who already have diabetes, sexual problems can indicate nerve damage, blocked arteries, and hormones that are functioning in haphazard manner.

The scientists say one of the main sexual problems men with diabetes face is the inability to have an erection, as damage to the vascular system can impair blood flow.
“If the blood vessels aren’t functioning properly or if an artery is blocked, not enough blood will travel to the penis, making it difficult to get an erection,” they warn.

Psychological, psychiatric and neurological diseases

Problems such as psychosis, intense stress and depression don’t only cause erectile dysfunction, they also cause lack of libido and ejaculation disorders.

Rauf says that performance anxiety is also an important psychogenic problem (having a psychological origin or cause rather than a physical one) that causes excessive nervousness and erection problems in men.

Neurological diseases such as Parkinson’s, Multiple Sclerosis and epilepsy can affect many functions of the body, including erection, with the damage they cause in the brain and peripheral nerves.

Also, the head and spine trauma that is suffered particularly in traffic accidents cause many problems including sexual dysfunction.

Punch Games

Ask any adult the type of diseases that mosquitoes give, and malaria fever is likely to be the answer. While this is true, the awful fact is that mosquito bites transmit more than malaria, because the disease that a particular mosquito carries depends on the mosquito type.

So, what kinds of diseases are mosquitoes capable of inflicting on their victims? These ones…

West Nile fever

West Nile fever is a mosquito-borne infection by the West Nile virus. As bad as this fever is, experts say, approximately 80 percent of the infections in humans have few or no symptoms.

Experts however warn that “serious problems can include infection of the brain (encephalitis), spinal cord, and tissues surrounding the brain and spinal cord (meningitis), which can be fatal.” Most cases of WNV are not serious and many people have no symptoms or they may only manifest mild flu-like symptoms, such as headaches, muscle aches and a high temperature (fever).

The best way to be sure of your ailment, therefore, is to see the doctor if you have some of these symptoms.

Zika virus disease

Experts say this virus is a member of the virus family Flaviviridae and the genus Flavivirus. Zika virus disease is mainly spread by mosquitoes.

“For most people, it is a very mild infection and isn’t harmful. However, it may be more serious for pregnant women, as there’s evidence that it causes birth defects — particularly, abnormally small heads (microcephaly),” scientists warn.

It is spread by the Aedes mosquitoes, such as A. aegypti and A. albopictus.

As bad as this disease is, experts say, most people don’t have any symptoms. If symptoms do occur, they are usually mild and last around two to seven days. But commonly reported symptoms include rash, itching all over the body, fever, headache, joint pain (with possible swelling, mainly in the smaller joints of the hands and feet), muscle pain, conjunctivitis (red eyes), lower back pain and pain behind the eyes.

St. Louis encephalitis virus

Like others, the SLEV is transmitted to humans through the bite of an infected mosquito. The symptoms include fever, headache, nausea, vomiting, and tiredness.

Infected older adults could develop encephalitis, which is an inflammation of the brain, and it could result in long-term disability or death if it is not carefully treated by doctor on time.

Yellow fever virus

A General Practitioner, Dr. Tunde Owoseni, says, “The specie of mosquito that is known to transmit the virus that causes yellow fever is called Aedes aegypti.”

“Yellow fever is not to be taken lightly, as it could kill if urgent care is not sought,” he warns.

Owoseni notes that yellow fever has three stages of infection, and they are:

Stage 3 (intoxication): Problems with many organs may occur, including the heart, liver, and kidney.

Dengue fever

Experts say, “Dengue fever is a painful, debilitating mosquito-borne disease caused by any one of four closely-related dengue viruses. These viruses are related to the viruses that cause West Nile infection and yellow fever.

“Dengue fever is transmitted by the bite of an Aedes mosquito infected with a dengue virus.”

Like the other disease-transmitting mosquitoes, experts say, the Aedes mosquito becomes infected when it bites a person who has the dengue virus in his/her blood; and when such an infected mosquito bites an otherwise healthy person, s/he also becomes infected.

Owoseni says that the symptoms of dengue usually begin to manifest four to six days after infection and could last for up to 10 days if treatment is not sought.

“The symptoms include sudden, high fever, severe headaches, pain behind the eyes, severe joint and muscle pain, fatigue, nausea, vomiting, skin rash, which appears two to five days after the onset of fever, mild bleeding (such as nose bleed, bleeding gums, or easy bruising),” Owoseni explains.

Malaria fever

The World Health Organisation says malaria is caused by parasites that are transmitted to people through the bites of infected female mosquitoes such as the P. falciparum, which is said to be the deadliest malaria parasite and the most prevalent in Africa.

“The first symptoms of malaria include fever, headache, chills and vomiting, and they usually appear between 10 and 15 days after the mosquito bite.

The bottom line: Mosquitoes are killers. Rid your environment of mosquitoes by disposing of empty containers that could hold unwanted water for days. Use mosquito-treated nets, and also insecticide in well-ventilated rooms as necessary.

Kill mosquito before mosquito kills you!

Copyright PUNCH.All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from PUNCH.